Elizabeth Macklin

Sign Language

Where the great hands
spell out the A
to Z and a
scatter clearly
means scatter, a
pinkie held to
the heart then
an eye means
I see, the grammar
of which doesn't
matter: a non-
restrictive
relation's
conveyed by a
gesture; the face
is the only
true place for
expressions of
love, indecision,
rapture; two hands
brushing the
air past the ears
mean "You lost me,"
were over my head,
while love still
appears on the
heart (two crossed hands),
not in the head,
and practice
is one hand a plane
planing the back
of the other—
We do so nearly
believe we'll have
said what we needed
to say, with our
long training.


©2000, from You've Just Been Told.
Reprinted with permission of W. W. Norton & Company.